Wiesel’s Reasons for Writing In the book Night, Elie Wiesel explains, in great detail, his experiences as a Jewish teenager during the Holocaust at 2 concentration camps. Wiesel considers himself as a witness who believes he has forced himself to testify, and that he has a responsibility, as a witness who believes he has a moral obligation to try to prevent the enemy from enjoying one last victory by allowing his crimes ro be erased from human memory. He has written Night for many reasons, including not to go mad, because otherwise he would have surely lost his mind. Another was a memoir to preserve a record of the ordeal he endured as an adolescent and to leave behind a legacy of words, of memories, to help prevent history from repeating himself itself. Wiesel believes it is important to emphasize how strongly he felt that books, just like people, have a destiny. Some invite sorrow, others joy, some both. Also, Wiesel maintains that Night, this personal record, coming as it does after so many others and describing an abomination such as we might have thought no longer had any secrets for us, is different distinct, and unique nevertheless.
Assignment 2: Holocaust Web Search
Night Web Search
Background Information for the Holocaust Use the following websites for a quick overview of the following terms and people. http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/
Topics to Know
Questions
Answers
Nazi Propaganda
Who is Joseph Goebbels?
List three things the Nazis did to ensure that their views were shown/heard in the most persuasive manner possible.
Joseph Goebbels was the Minister of propaganda and National Enlightenment.
1) If you produced any type of media, you had to be a member Reich Chamber, a group whose members were appointed by Nazi’s.
2) Ransacked libraries to remove “offending” books
3) the sale of cheap radios to ensure that the people of Germany could hear Hitler speak
Kristallnacht/ The Final Solution/ Wannsee Conference
Kristallnacht, or “Night of Broken Glass” WERE Nazi staged vicious pogroms, anti-Jewish riots against the Jewish community of Germany.
15 High-ranking Nazi and German officials gathered in Wannsee, Berlin at the Wannsee Conference to coordinate the implantation of the “Final solution of the Jewish Question.”
The “Final Solution” was a systematic, deliberate, physical annihilation of the European Jews.
The Victims
Besides the Jewish people, list seven other groups were also targets/victims of the Holocaust?
Briefly tell the fate of each group under Nazi rule.
Closed ghettos were closed off by walls, or by fences with barbed wire. Nazi’s often kept Jews in these.
Open ghettos were not sealed off like closed ghettos, there were restrictions on entering and leaving.
Destruction ghettos were tightly sealed off and only existed for a few weeks, until Germans deported or shot the Jewish population.
Ghettos had miserable conditions. They were extremely Crowded and unsanitary conditions. Starvation, chronic shortages, severe winter weather, inadequate and unheated housing invested ghettos.
Labor camps were designed for intense, forced labor. However, Extermination camps were designed for mass murder.
All the Jews were put in gas chambers disguised as showers sprayed down with Zyklon B. Upon arrival to these death camps, Jews were immediately escorted to gas chambers.
Nearly 2,700,000 Jews were killed during the Holocaust using asphyxiation or shooting.
The soviets liberated Auschwitz, Stutthof, Sachsenhausen, and Ravensbrueck, and also additional camps in the Baltic states and Poland.
Towards the end of the war, Hitler committed suicide.
During the Nuremberg Trials, 24 defendants were selected to represent “a cross-section of German diplomatic, economic, political, and military leadership.
The International Military Tribunal declared to the world that “following orders” was not a legitimate defense for criminal acts.
Assignment 3: Images of Night
Opportunity
Opportunity
Missed and Unnoticed
Overlooking, Neglecting, and Disregarding
Like missing important events - you can't get them back and like wasting time, once it's gone - it is gone forever
The Birth of a Child
Ignoring
In front of your eyes yet completely overseen
Table of Contents
Zuri M. Night Assignments
Assignment 1: Reasons for Writing
Wiesel’s Reasons for WritingIn the book Night, Elie Wiesel explains, in great detail, his experiences as a Jewish teenager during the Holocaust at 2 concentration camps. Wiesel considers himself as a witness who believes he has forced himself to testify, and that he has a responsibility, as a witness who believes he has a moral obligation to try to prevent the enemy from enjoying one last victory by allowing his crimes ro be erased from human memory. He has written Night for many reasons, including not to go mad, because otherwise he would have surely lost his mind. Another was a memoir to preserve a record of the ordeal he endured as an adolescent and to leave behind a legacy of words, of memories, to help prevent history from repeating himself itself. Wiesel believes it is important to emphasize how strongly he felt that books, just like people, have a destiny. Some invite sorrow, others joy, some both. Also, Wiesel maintains that Night, this personal record, coming as it does after so many others and describing an abomination such as we might have thought no longer had any secrets for us, is different distinct, and unique nevertheless.
Assignment 2: Holocaust Web Search
Night Web SearchBackground Information for the Holocaust Use the following websites for a quick overview of the following terms and people.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/
List three things the Nazis did to ensure that their views were shown/heard in the most persuasive manner possible.
http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/propaganda_in_nazi_germany.htm
1) If you produced any type of media, you had to be a member Reich Chamber, a group whose members were appointed by Nazi’s.
2) Ransacked libraries to remove “offending” books
3) the sale of cheap radios to ensure that the people of Germany could hear Hitler speak
Wannsee Conference
http://www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/focus/kristallnacht/
Who attended and what was decided at the Wannsee Conference?
What was the Final Solution?
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005477
15 High-ranking Nazi and German officials gathered in Wannsee, Berlin at the Wannsee Conference to coordinate the implantation of the “Final solution of the Jewish Question.”
The “Final Solution” was a systematic, deliberate, physical annihilation of the European Jews.
Briefly tell the fate of each group under Nazi rule.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10007457
CLUE: Begin reading at “Targeted Groups”
Nazi’s sought to eliminate domestic non-conformists and so-called racial threats through a perpetual self-purge of German society.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005059
What was life like in the ghettos?
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10007445
Open ghettos were not sealed off like closed ghettos, there were restrictions on entering and leaving.
Destruction ghettos were tightly sealed off and only existed for a few weeks, until Germans deported or shot the Jewish population.
Ghettos had miserable conditions. They were extremely Crowded and unsanitary conditions. Starvation, chronic shortages, severe winter weather, inadequate and unheated housing invested ghettos.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005144
What were the conditions?
What different types of extermination were performed?
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005145
All the Jews were put in gas chambers disguised as showers sprayed down with Zyklon B. Upon arrival to these death camps, Jews were immediately escorted to gas chambers.
Nearly 2,700,000 Jews were killed during the Holocaust using asphyxiation or shooting.
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005131
What did Hitler do near the end of the war?
How many defendants were charged during the Nuremberg Trials? What did they represent?
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10007143
What did the International Military Tribunal decide was not a legitimate defense?
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10007142
Towards the end of the war, Hitler committed suicide.
During the Nuremberg Trials, 24 defendants were selected to represent “a cross-section of German diplomatic, economic, political, and military leadership.
The International Military Tribunal declared to the world that “following orders” was not a legitimate defense for criminal acts.
Assignment 3: Images of Night
Opportunity
Opportunity
Missed and Unnoticed
Overlooking, Neglecting, and Disregarding
Like missing important events - you can't get them back and like wasting time, once it's gone - it is gone forever
The Birth of a Child
Ignoring
In front of your eyes yet completely overseen